


a boy who likes boys is a dead boy

by TheFlirtMeister



Category: Hemlock Grove
Genre: F/M, Implied/Referenced Incest, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Slurs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-10-03
Packaged: 2019-01-07 09:17:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12229983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFlirtMeister/pseuds/TheFlirtMeister
Summary: “Do you know what happens to boys who kiss boys?”Roman raises his head, looks up at his mother. The way she's standing, she's blocking out the sun, and Roman can't look at her for long.“What happens?” He asks.“They get killed.” She replies, and Roman should have taken that as a warning, and not just an observation.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> im so sorry this is so fucking depressing, i was just trying to make a happy story, what the fuck have i done

When Roman is 8, his mother tries to drown him in the family swimming pool. She holds him down as he screams and struggles, water in his mouth and down his nose and his eyes are raw with crying and chlorine.

Just as Roman is giving up, body going limp, the darkness appearing in spots in the corner of his eyes, Olivia hauls him out of the pool, and watches him gasp for air on the patio. He vomits over himself as he tries to breathe, and Olivia wrinkles her nose in utter disgust.

“What do you say?” She says, as Roman gags.

“I can't breathe.”

“If you couldn't breathe then you couldn't speak.” She snaps.

She's fully dressed, a beautiful white dress that is wet with splash marks from trying to kill him. Her nails are painted white to match, and she's grown them long so it hurts when she slaps Roman across the face. “What do you say?”

“I'm sorry.” Roman says, staring down at the reflection of his face in the puddle of water from the pool. His eyes are red, snot running from his nose, sick around his mouth.

“What are you sorry for Roman?” Olivia asks, and when Roman doesn't reply, she hits the back of his head. “What are you sorry for?”

“Kissing my friend.” Roman whispers, and he's at the tender age where he doesn't understand why kissing boys is wrong, but this day, which started out as nothing in particular, is the day where that all changes.

His friend, Harris, coincidentally a boy he will never see again, not even as adults, has been sent home. Roman didn't realise his mother was watching them play, that she always watches Roman play to keep an eye on things. She's never told Roman off for the time that he set alight to a girl's plait with a stolen lighter, or the time that he pushed another boy into the ground to stop him winning a race.

She intervenes however, when Roman shyly leans across to his friend, and kisses him on the mouth.

“It's disgusting.” Olivia says, and stands up finally, smoothing down her dress. “It's barbaric and ugly.”

Roman spits blood from his mouth. His head is aching, it will soon turn into a migraine and he'll have to lay in bed with the curtains drawn, curled up into a little ball. Olivia won't let him have stuffed animals any more, so he has to cuddle his pillow instead.

“Do you know what happens to boys who kiss boys?”

Roman raises his head, looks up at his mother. The way she's standing, she's blocking out the sun, and Roman can't look at her for long.

“What happens?” He asks.

“They get killed.” She replies, and Roman should have taken that as a warning, and not just an observation.

The thing about Olivia is, she tries to kill Roman a lot throughout his short life. At age 5 she once pushed him into incoming traffic to see what he would do, the answer being, he came running back to her and clung to her leg, bawling. She pushed him right out into the path of a taxi at that, and paid the driver off for any damages caused.

She's encouraged him to climb on dangerous objects, to play with fire and knives, she watches him snort cocaine off his fucking desk and doesn't give a damn. Roman finds himself doing more and more things to himself to get her attention, going even as far as to cut his own wrist in front of her. At that, she had taken hold of his hand and sucked the blood away, before wiping his own blood stained hand on his face.

“Clean yourself up.” She'd said, and Roman had glowered because he wanted more.

Over time the incidents blur together into one mess of pain, and Olivia watching him silently, smiling to herself. Roman can never escape the memory of the swimming pool though, and how Olivia had drowned the gay side out of him.

So Roman doesn't kiss boys, and he doesn't touch boys, and he lashes out at any boy that comes near him. He gets into fights on the playground, the only time that he can touch people, wrestling in the dirt and punching until his knuckles are bloody. Olivia drags him out of school, staring at her teenage son in his ruined uniform, his black eye and bloody lip.

“Godfrey's don't start fights-”

“But they finish them?” Roman finishes sarcastically, and Olivia glares.

“No. They get other people to fight for them.” Olivia reaches into her pocket and pulls out a wad of cash, throwing it at him. “Here.”

“What's this for?” Roman asks, pocketing the cash.

“Get people to fight for you Roman.” Olivia snaps, “If you like it so much. Just don't fucking embarrass yourself by rolling around on the floor with the other boys.”

“You'd much rather me rolling around on the floor with other girls?” Roman asks.

“Yes.” Olivia says, and nods towards the cash in Roman's pocket. “Go buy some prostitute, or bribe some girl to fuck you. Just don't get caught.”

“I won't.” Roman says, and feels the weight of the cash in his pocket, hot and heavy.

He uses it for girls, of course he does. He likes girls, likes how soft they are, the way they feel when they're rubbing up against him, telling him how much his reputation means to them. He fucks them in school toilets, in his car, in nightclubs. He doesn't even remember their names half the time, not even their faces, and several times he's asked the same girl for sex. They always agree though. It's the Godfrey power.

One night he comes home late, late enough that even Olivia is in her coffin somewhere. All the lights are off at home, and Roman is drunk, and he's got hickies all over his neck and his stomach from a girl with hair like a boy. He stumbles his way through the house, having to cling onto the bannister in order to drag himself up the stairs.

Roman throws open the door to his bedroom, and turns on the lights, in a way that involves hitting the wall with his palm until the light switches on. It hurts like a bitch, the button digging into the soft skin on his wrist.

“Roman.” Shelley says, sitting on the bed without her wig on. She's typing on her phone to talk to him, and the voice is cold and mechanical. Roman jumps about a foot in the air, and then recovers fast, which isn't fast at all.

“Hey Shell.” Roman says, and he's slurring his words so bad he can see Shelley struggling to understand him. “What's up?”

“You're never home at a normal time any more.” Shelley says, “I miss you Roman, we never hang out any more.

Her face is giving off a faint blue glow, and Roman kicks off his shoes wildly, before collapsing onto the bed beside her. Shelley watches him carefully, her eye big and wide and hurt.

“We're hanging out right now.” He says, and then yawns. His breath smells of cheap beer.

“Not properly.” Shelley's bottom lip wobbles as she writes. “You're never home any more!”

“I'm an adult.” Roman says, “I can come home whenever I want.”

“You smell of alcohol. You're underage.”

“Shee-it.” Roman says, like he's just realised that. “I thought I was 21 all this time!”

“Roman.” Shelley says, and Roman reaches up and boops her on the nose.

“I'm fine.” He says, dragging out the last syllable. “Everything's going to be fine.”

“I'm worried about you.” Shelley says, glowing bluer, and Roman takes hold of her hand and brings it to his lips.

“Same.” He says, and passes out.

So Roman has a routine, and that routine involves sex and drinking and a various amount of drugs. Roman stops coming home, spending days hopping from bar to bar, with girl after girl after girl taking weed and poppers and LSD and cocaine.

Roman crawls into the kitchen for breakfast as Shelley reads classic novels at the table, hiding behind her hair. Olivia and Roman share terse words over food, and Roman burps cider, and then eats his weight in toast. Then he goes upstairs and sleeps, and then wanks himself off, and eats something for lunch. Easy. Simple.

“You need to go to school.” Olivia finally says one day. “People are getting suspicious.”

Roman raises his head from where he was pressing his cheek into his plate of scrabbled eggs. When he sits upright, egg drips from his cheek and onto the table. “What?”

“You need to go to school Roman.” Olivia says, and takes a sip of her breakfast cocktail. “The school have been in touch.”

“Pay them off.”

“You need an education.” Olivia narrows her eyes. “I do not want my only son to be an idiot.”

“It's too late for that.” Roman mumbles, and Olivia reaches across the table and grips his wrist in hers, digging in her nails.

“Roman.” She hisses, “Go to school.”

Roman stares Olivia down, her nails going further and further into his skin until there's an awful moment where the nails cut through into his skin. Roman winces, pulling his hand back, and Olivia smiles.

“I'll go to school.” Roman says, and blood drips down onto the table.

School is awful, as expected. Roman sleeps at the back of glass, or fucks other students, and is generally bored and unmotivated. He gets to see Shelley every day though, which is a plus, and he enjoys hurting people who hurt her.

“Kiss.” Roman orders two boys who push her over in the corridor.

“Roman-” One of them starts, and Roman spits at their feet.

“Kiss.” He says, like kissing a boy is the worst thing in the world, that he's making them commit the most unholiest of acts, and he hates how he enjoys it when they follow out his orders.

“You didn't have to make them do that.” Shelley says on the ride home, and she's leaning up into Roman's space, but it's okay, because she's a girl and it's fine.

“Yeah I did.” Roman says, already fiddling in his coat pocket for a packet of cigarettes, listening to the clack of keys as she already begins typing on her phone. “They were dicks to you Shelley.”

“You didn't need to make them kiss.” Shelley says, and looks up at him. “It was horrible.”

“Yeah I know.” Roman says, lighting the cigarette and inhaling sharp.

“Roman.” Shelley says, and taps the word again so it repeats. “Being gay isn't horrible.”

Roman stares out at the road, and then exhales a perfect smoke ring. “Yeah it is.”

There's a long silence, and then Shelley reaches out suddenly, and grabs the wheel. They go spinning across the road, cars screaming at them from both in front and behind, and Roman has to grab hold of the wheel with both hands. He pulls the car over to the side of the road, panting hard.

“What the fuck Shelley?” He explodes, “You could have gotten us both killed!”

Shelley's crying now, burying her face in her hands. Roman drags his nails down his face, gritting his teeth, and then turns off the engine.

“I'm sorry.” He says, “Shelley, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to yell.”

Shelley reaches for her phone with shaky hands, typing awkwardly. “You're so cruel.”

“I'm sorry.”

“I want to walk home.”

“No, you can't.” Roman says, “It's not safe.”

“I don't want to be in the car with you.” Shelley says. “You're not a good person.”

Roman runs his hands through his hair. “Shelley, I'm sorry. I'll buy you an ice cream or something, make it up to you.”

“I don't want ice cream.”

“What do you want?” Roman asks. Shelley bites at her bottom lip.

“I don't want you to be such a dick.” She says, and it's so blunt and matter of fact that Roman gives a bark of laughter.

“I don't think you're going to get that Shells.” He says gently, and they both fall silent.

So Roman is sweet and good that week, for his baby sister. He goes to class and listens, he hangs out with her in free periods and makes her laugh with stupid faces, they even do homework together in the library. It's fun, Roman thinks, as he doodles a solar system on the side of his page. It's nice to stop being such an asshole all the time.

And then fucking Peter Rumancek turns up and turns everything to shit.

It takes a while for Peter to wheedle his way into Roman's life. Roman doesn't want him there for starters, he wants Peter as far away from him as possible in fact. But Peter is persistent, so persistent that Roman is always surprised when he opens his bedroom door and Peter hasn't broken into his room.

Roman doesn't want Peter in his room. He wants Peter nowhere near his house, nowhere near his school, nowhere near his _life_. Peter is everything that Roman hates, because Peter is friendly and loving and warm, and he's affectionate to the point that Shelley willingly hugs him.

Roman refuses to let Peter hug him.

“Why?” Peter asks, after Roman had shoved him away so hard that Peter had almost fallen over. “It's just a hug, Jesus Roman.”

“I hate people touching me.” Roman says, folding his arms around himself.

“Yet you've fucked half the female student population?” Peter asks, raising his eyebrow.

“That's different. Girls are different.”

“I'll be a girl for you Roman.” Peter says, and flicks his long hair. “Oh, Mr Godfrey! I'm so impressed by your fancy car, and how the size of your dick is equal to how much of a dick you are in real life.”

“Oh fuck off Peter.” Roman says. “Literally, get fucked. As in, shove a cactus up your ass.”

“You'd like that wouldn't you?” Peter says, grinning. “Fuck me Roman. Fuck me like one of your French girls.”

“I'm going to fucking kill you.” Roman says, and actually pushes him over onto the floor, Peter laughing all the while.

Olivia hates Peter, of course. The best thing about this however, is because Peter earnestly tries to make her like him, constantly talking to her and telling her about his day. Olivia stabs random things with a knife, and glowers, and walks out halfway through Peter's monologue.

“I think she likes me!” Peter says brightly, and both Roman and Shelley snort with laughter.

“She hates you.” Roman says, “But don't worry, she hates everyone.”

“Even you?” Peter asks, his eyes twinkling, as if he's expecting Roman to laugh again, and say no, his mother loves him.

“Even me.” Roman says, and he opens his mouth to tell Peter about the day she tried to drown him, but then remembers it's because Roman is sick and deformed on the inside, and closes his mouth again.

“Shee-it.” Peter says, and reaches across the table and pats Roman on the hand. Roman blinks hard, and doesn't move his hand away. “At least my mom loves you. And you Shelley.”

“I've never met your mom properly.” Shelley says.

“Yeah, but she still loves you!” Peter says brightly, and Roman suddenly thinks of a life where he and Shelley grew up in Peter's home.

They would have been loved. They would have been comforted when they cried. Roman probably would let people hug him, instead of punching them whenever they tried. He might even kiss boys.

Roman stands up so abruptly that he knocks the chair backwards. “I need to go.”

“What's wrong?” Peter asks, looking fucking concerned, which just makes it worse.

“I-” Roman starts, and leaves the room, because no, he won't think about kissing Peter, _no, no, no_.

If this was a movie, Roman thinks, as he stalks down the corridor, fiddling with his collar, Peter would come running after him. They'd have a tense conversation, perhaps they'd end up arguing, and then they'd snog against a wall.

Instead, nobody follows him. There is no scrape of Peter's chair, the opening and shutting of the kitchen door. The only sound is Peter talking, and the mechanical voice of Shelley's phone, and Roman wants to slit his own wrists.

When Olivia and Roman next speak, Roman can't actually get out of bed because he's destroyed his own thighs with a razor. It's not as bad as it sounds, he just needs recovery time, which he's pretending is just a cold.

“I don't want that gypsy boy in my house.” Olivia says, sitting on the edge of Roman's bed. She lays her hand on Roman's knee, and Roman can't bring himself to jerk it away.

“Gypsy is a slur.” Roman says, and his voice is slurred from pain killers.

“Fine.” Olivia says. “I don't want that retard in my house.”

Roman raises his eyebrow at her. “I'm tired. I want to sleep.”

“You didn't answer me.” Olivia slides her hand further, and it's resting on where Roman's cuts are. “Tell me Roman. What do I want?”

“You don't want Peter in the house any more.” Roman says, and his mother's hand is too heavy on his skin. “Fine. We'll go somewhere else.”

“You shouldn't hang out with him. He's bad news.”

“I'm bad news.” Roman says, “More than him.”

Olivia smiles at him, and it makes Roman want to vomit. “You're my baby boy.” She says, sickly sweet, and leans in to kiss him on the cheek, close enough to his mouth that Roman can hear the child abuse services alerts.

“I'm yours.” Roman says, and he's too sleepy to start a fight, so he lets his mom kiss him, and touch him, and wonders what he can use to hurt himself later.

If there's one thing that Roman can give himself credit for, is that sometimes, he doesn't listen to his mother. It's not that often, but there's something about Peter that makes Roman want to break all the rules. Not the main rule though, that dictates Roman's life. He doesn't break that.

This is how he ends up in Peter's trailer almost every day after school, or how they end up driving around Hemlock Grove listening to shit terrible music and eating awful food. They're a disgusting pair of teenage boys, and Roman loves it. Sometimes he just wants to lean over and grab hold of Peter's hand and grip it tight, and explode, tell Peter how much he means to him.

But he never does. Boys don't care about other boys. Boys don't love other boys like how Roman loves Peter. And Roman will never let anyone know how he feels.

One person knows though. Standing in Destiny's apartment, she grabs hold of Roman's palm, and strokes his life line. Roman smirks, expecting her to state some bullshit about how he'll have a long and happy life, but instead she bites her lip, looking up at him.

 _She knows_ , Roman thinks suddenly. _She's looked into my soul and she knows that I'm rotten to the core._

“See anything interesting?” He asks, trying to hide his fear.

“Hmm.” Destiny says in reply, and then folds up all his fingers into his palm, and then slaps his hand away.

Peter looks at Roman over her shoulder and pulls a face. Roman swallows hard, and looks down at his hand, expecting it to have a slur carved into the very lines of his palm. Except, it's just his hand, and there are no markings, and Destiny might just be a drug pushing fraud.

Maybe. Roman doesn't want to investigate further. He doesn't want to stare at that part of himself in the mirror, and have it stare back.

It's just simpler, if he hides.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me taking a hit: but what if........ i wrote the second chapter.......... more depressing.......

Roman and Peter have three years together. Roman wouldn't call them perfect, nothing in Roman's life is ever perfect. Apart from maybe Shelley, but she'd disagree at that, flicking her hair over the right hand side of her face anxiously.

There's a theory, that when you're younger, a year seems like an eternity. It's all to do with time, and how you've never had to deal with anything as long and as strenuous as a year before, so your brain struggles to process it. When you're older however, the years come quick and fast, until you blink and realise you've wasted thirty years of your life.

Roman wishes he could have had thirty years with Peter. He wouldn't have even minded if they'd flown past in an instant, just the knowledge that he spent 30 years of his life, by Peter's side. That they grew together, that they moved past the awful ugly teenage phase and got to be adults, proper adults, with jobs. Maybe they'd have lived together. Maybe they wouldn't.

“I wish I knew how to quit you,” Their English teacher says as she reads aloud from Brokeback Mountain.

The class explodes into laughter, several people have already been sent out when the teacher read the first sex scene, and Roman sits in the corner, his face red. He's angry and confused all at once, and he just wants the lesson to be over, for their teacher to shut up, and he wants to be out of this fucking school, this fucking _life_.

Peter kicks Roman hard under the table, he's shot up a foot seemingly overnight so he sprawls out in his seat, over his desk. He slouches in his chair, all long limbs and crooked mouth, unlike Roman, who sits straight upright, like he has a iron pole for a spine.

“What?” Roman hisses, and Peter grins.

“Roman, you son of a whoreson bitch.” He quotes, mouthing the words all over the top, and Roman kicks him back.

“You're a whore's bitch.” Roman says, and Peter laughs, loud enough that people look.

“What's funny Rumancek?” The teacher asks, and Peter reaches out, runs a hand through Roman's hair.

“Just expressing my love for my good buddy here.” Peter says, and Roman fiddles with his hair, trying to fix it.

“Hilarious, Mr Rumancek.” The teacher sighs, and Peter laughs again as the bell for the end of class goes. “Your homework is-”

But everyone is jumping to their feet, Roman included, shoving everything into his bag so he can get out, and get away from Peter as far as possible. Peter is talking to some girl, flicking his hair from his eyes as he speaks, and Roman's stomach flips, and he marches out of the classroom without a second glance.

So, yeah. Three years. Three years of fighting and screaming at each other, and running through graveyards covered in blood, and fighting even more until Roman has a wolf at his chest and a paralysed back, and-

He's getting ahead of himself. He shouldn't look back at their awful horrible moments, he should look at their good. The memories fade though, until Roman can just see wisps of Peter's smile, and the way he picks flesh out of his teeth with a knife.

Roman supposes this is what a best friend is like. He tries to keep Peter far apart at first, or at least, refuses to let them be in the same room together, alone. Roman drags Shelley to meet Peter after school, Shelley complaining all the while, and he insists on introducing Letha to Peter so they'll have a girl to diffuse the tension.

Well. The inclusion of Letha goes well.

Letha brings blood and despair and hatred, and leads to Roman's first heartbreak, not even from his fucking cousin's death, but because Peter leaves and Roman is _broken_. He destroys rooms, and himself, and his mother watches him all the while and reminds him what a fucking disaster he is.

The first night without Peter, the first night that Peter has not been in Hemlock Grove since Roman met him, he touches himself and thinks of Peter. It's awful, and he hates himself, crying as he lays in his bed, palming his cock in his hand.

He thinks of Peter's face and mouth and fingers and how he kisses girls, and how he might kiss a boy, and Roman howls into a pillow, biting it with teeth that are too sharp to do anything kind, that will never clumsily knock against Peter's as they kiss, and he hates himself so much he might die because of it.

It's the first time ever that he's accepted that just maybe, his mother didn't kill all the gay from him, when she drowned him.

Roman doesn't want to think of this now though, the time he cried as he jerked himself off thinking of a Romani boy. Instead he thinks of happy times, the few that they had, and they all tumble together as one, like how Roman and Peter used to play fight like children.

Roman thinks of drinking with Peter, the way he wraps his entire mouth around the bottle before tipping it back, swallowing the contents. Peter will drink anything as long as it's alcoholic, and Roman wouldn't put it past him not to drink mouthwash. Roman watches his Adams apple bob, the way his beard travels down his neck, almost to his chest. He's seen Peter naked, he's hairy and stocky, exactly like the wolf he transforms into.

Peter teases Roman about his body, “You're all legs,” He says once as they change from swimming one time, in the cool casual way that boys can be naked together, “You've got too many legs Godfrey.”

“I've got the perfectly normal amount of legs.” Roman replies, standing on one leg to slide his underwear up his thighs, and he's staring determinedly at the wall so he doesn't have to see Peter's cock.

“Nah,” Peter shakes his head, water droplets flying everywhere, “You've got legs up to your armpits.”

Roman turns at that, and Peter is just standing there in a pair of tattered boxers. They've got holes in, stained grey with sweat and dirt, but Peter stands proud, hands on his hips. Roman flicks Peter's thigh with a towel.

“You need some new underwear.”

“I can't afford new underwear.” Peter says, already searching for his shirt to put on.

“I'll buy you new underwear.” Roman says without thinking, Peter turning round quick.

“I don't need your charity.” Peter says, a little hurt, despite the fact that months later he will stand in front of Roman and beg for money, and Roman will try not to open himself up and give him everything.

“Underwear isn't charity.” Roman says, “You just need new boxers, Jesus. I can smell them from here.”

“What do they smell like?” Peter asks, and he's got a fucking cocky mouth and Roman wants to bite it away.

“Sweat. And cum.” Roman says, and pulls on his trousers fast, too fast, but Peter doesn't seem to notice, laughing.

“You dick.” He says, and then shrugs. “Fine. Buy me a whole new wardrobe. I'll dress like the new Godfrey heir. Nobody will be able to recognise me.”

“That's a good thing.” Roman says, like he wouldn't want Peter to stay this way perfectly forever.

Peter flips him off lazily, and Roman repeats the gesture, and then they continue getting dressed silently, because they know the moment has passed, and boys do not joke like this with their clothes on.

As the months go on however, Roman feels different. Not just because of the blood lust, worse than ever, he cuts himself nightly and sucks the blood from his torn skin, but because maybe, just maybe, wanting Peter isn't so bad. Compared to everything else in his fucked up life, surely being in love counteracts that?

“Do you have any crushes on anyone?” He asks Shelley one day, laying on her bed as she sits on the floor, reading.

She looks up alarmed, “No!” She says loudly, her voice too big for her mouth. “Why?”

“I think I like someone.” Roman says, and he feels physically sick with worry. Shelley is the only person he cares about, and he knows she'll accept him, but at the same time, Roman doesn't know anything any more.

“Oh.” Shelley says, “Have you made love yet?”

Roman snorts, “No. We probably never will.”

“You sleep with everyone.” Shelley says, and Roman slides off the bed to sit beside her.

“Don't slut shame.” He says, and Shelley laughs, before closing her book and snuggling into him.

“I love you Roman.” She says, and it echoes around the room.

“I love you too.” Roman says, surprised, and kisses her cheek blue.

Later on, people will say it's suspicious that Roman and Peter only hung out with other girls. They literally never spoke to any of the other men in Hemlock Grove, apart from family, or doctors. It disappoints Olivia, that her son's only male friend is Roman, but she scared all the others away. Or seduced them. It's a tricky life she leads.

“So what, it's just the two of you?” Miranda asks, sitting on Roman's kitchen counter like she owns the place. Roman keeps trying to push her off, but she laughs.

“Just the two of us.” Peter replies, fixing himself some sort of steak and occasionally slicing a piece off and giving it to Roman to chew.

“You should have a third.” Miranda says confidentially. “Then you could be a trio. That's much nicer than just two of you, it must be so lonely.”

“I'm not lonely.” Roman says, despite the fact that he reeks of it.

“Neither am I.” Peter says, and tosses raw steak into his open mouth.

Roman keeps the threesome tucked away in his brain, right at the back, covered in cloth, because he knows if he looks at it, all his emotions will come running out at once. Just thinking about it makes him shake, thinking of Miranda, and himself, and Peter, beautiful Peter.

They fucked. Or at least, Peter fucked Miranda from behind, and Miranda sucked Roman's cock, looking up at him throughout, her lips stretched around his cock, and smiling at him. Perhaps she thought this would help the two of them reconcile, that watching Peter come will somehow make Roman stop hating him.

It doesn't work. Not even when Miranda gags on his cock, and both Peter and Roman had reached out and stroked her hair, not even when Peter flips Miranda onto her back to fuck her, and Roman had face fucked her mouth, and they'd both looked at each other, as Miranda gasped between them.

“You two should kiss.” Miranda murmurs, her tits leaking milk all over her body, all over the bed, in both Peter and Roman's mouths.

“We're good, thanks.” Peter says, and Roman shuts his eyes, because Peter doesn't want him.

It shouldn't sting like this, the way Peter says it so dismissively, that of course he doesn't want to kiss Roman. Who does want to kiss Roman as a matter of fact? He's creepy and cold, and he only fucks girls when they're on their period. It's no wonder Peter wants to be nowhere near his mouth.

“Aw.” Miranda sighs, pouting, and then kisses Roman's thigh. “There you go. I did it for you.”

Roman forces himself to smile, brushes Miranda's hair from her eyes, and then shoves his cock back into her mouth so she'll stop making things difficult.

Miranda had been another of those bright ideas too. Roman wishes he'd never let her into his house, into his life, that he'd refused to open the door to rescue her, poor and stranded girl. He might not have seen Peter come, but at least he'd still have Nadia.

He doesn't like thinking about Nadia. His mind is instantly filled with her perfect baby smell and her perfect baby giggle, and how she used to grip his finger with her whole hand and babble up at him, and even as he's saying this, he wants to cut open his heart.

Roman thinks, that if Peter had taken the time to look at Roman's heart, he would have seen his own name written the whole way through, like a stick of Blackpool rock. It's the last word on Roman's lips, consuming and beautiful.

Roman wishes that Peter had seen more, that if he hadn't been so caught up in Hemlock Grove, and all the puzzle pieces, if he'd stopped running for one minute, and if he'd just taken one step back, and looked at Roman properly, he would have seen that his best friend was in love with him.

“Get out of my house,” Roman says, and he's crying, but Peter doesn't understand, he doesn't get that if in that moment, he had stepped forward and taken hold of Roman's hand, brushing his lips against Roman's knuckles, Roman would have let him stay, forever, and none of this would have happened.

Before Roman gets to the ending, before he thinks of how two boys went into a house and only the wolf came out, he tries to remember more of the good. He's fighting against the current, blood awash, but he forces himself to think.

The first time Roman saw Peter transform, and how he made a stupid joke about a Frisbee, but all he really wanted to do was go down on his knees and praise Peter, because Peter is so fucking beautiful as a wolf or as a human, although Roman supposes that he's really both.

The time that Peter took Roman's car out for a spin and they almost died because Peter is the worst driver, but Roman didn't care that he'd probably lose his life in the passenger seat, he'd just thrown his arms in the air and screamed with delight, and Peter had laughed, and spun the car round and around the road.

The time that Peter told Roman that they were friends, that Roman had his back, and Roman had wanted to take hold of Peter's hand and pull him close and tell him that he'll always have Peter's back, that he'll throw himself off a building if it would help Peter, that they're stuck together till death do them part, and oh, how awful it was that it came true.

Their ending is how they lived, fast and messy. The moment that Roman hits the ground, he knows that he's going to die, by his own hand, or by Peter's. He would prefer it to be Peter however, he's too tired to hurt himself any more.

“My back,” He murmurs, knowing his spine is broken, and when he tries to lift his legs, they are dead weight, “Peter.”

Peter growls, stalking around Roman's body, and Roman starts to cry, blood and tears staining his face, and he wants Peter to lick his face with his tongue.

“Peter.” He begs, and Peter towers over him, and Roman wants to reach out and kiss him because even Judas died because of a kiss.

He knows that he's ruined them both. That he will soon be just another of Hemlock's dead, and he knows that Peter will just be another of Hemlock's animals, and that their future will end right here together, in the dirt.

“Please.” He whispers, knowing that Peter can never deny him, and he's crying and shaking as Peter rips out his throat, and then his heart from his chest, spitting the muscle out onto the floor, hearing it land with a wet splat.

Death comes how Roman lived, quick and painful, with Peter at fault. He supposes his mother really was right, in the end, and he imagines her gloating in whatever hell dimension she's in, one that Roman will be joining very soon.

A boy who likes boys is a dead boy.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope nobody expected a happy ending

**Author's Note:**

> i might??? add another chapter to this, but i don't know!


End file.
